In this first episode of our spring 2026 season, we speak live from the Institute for Signifying Scriptures Annual Meeting in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. We discuss the introduction to Stephen Best's None Like Us: Blackness, Belonging, Aesthetic Life (Duke, 2018) with a focus on how scriptures make diasporas and what it takes to demystify and "decode" the scriptural traditions of social life. Special thanks to Richard Newton, University of Alabama Department of Religious Studies, for organizing this annual meeting and conversation.